How did American Flyer whistles work?

[handyandy]

How did the old American Flyer whistles work? I've seen some sort of box-like devices with a cylindrical piece stuck in them at train shows that say they are something or other to do with whistles for American Flyer trains. Are these stationary whistle units or controllers for on-board whistles?

Thanks,

Andy

[Texas Pete]

Speaking only for the air chime steam whistle in my first train set, not very well.  Even with a 100 watt (8B) transformer the train slowed considerably when the whistle blew.  And it sounded lousy, too.  I used it once or twice and never set it up again.

The "box" had a button on it, to activate the whistle, and the cylinder was some kind of oscillator that transmitted through the rails and got picked up by a circuit in the tender which activated a loudspeaker kind of like the ones in modern trains.

Here's a link to some pics

Here's a link to the wiring diagram

Hopefully someone more expert than I will chime in (oops) with a more detailed explanation for you.

Pete

[lionelsoni]

The "circuit in the tender" was just the loudspeaker, AC-coupled to the rails through a capacitor.  The AC coupling and the small speaker diameter both prevented the speaker from putting out much sound from the 60-hertz track voltage, while still responding to the higher frequency signal from the oscillator.

[handyandy]

Thanks Pete!

So the Flyer whistle tenders were not like Lionel with a motor, but were early electronic sound effects. Pretty cool.

I take from the link to the pictures the AF whistling billboards had a conventional motor like the Marx whistling depot or the 70's Tyco whistling billboard?

[handyandy]

Cool. Thanks Bob.

Now I know not to buy one of the control units without buying an AF whistle tender. I was thinking the cylindrical part was a whistle and when you pressed the button the "whistle" blew like a Marx whistling depot without the depot.

[lionelsoni]

Yes, a Flyer  whistling billboard contains an air whistle very similar to that in a Lionel whistling tender.

[LittleTommy]

Let me strongly recommend that you rethink buying a whistling tender. The air chime whistle is really horrible, it is more like a buzzer, and some modern transformers will superimpose a 60 cycle "hum" which is really annoying (if you hate reverse unit, aka e-unit, buzzing, this "hum" is far worse.)

 Hear what the air chime whistle  sounds like at http://youtu.be/jUWCebaeSCc

I have retrofitted all my locomotives that originally had  the Gilbert air chime whistles and horns with modern units-either from Williams or Electric RR Co, and have been very pleased.  Also Lionel will be coming out with RailSounds boxcars this year for both steam and diesel (or so they say).  American Models makes a diesel sound unit (that, unlike the Lionel units, is Available Now) that can be purchased fitted in their 50 foot boxcars and is quite acceptable.

Little Tommy

[lionelsoni]

Because the American Flyer whistle sound is generated outside the train, it is technically possible to send any audio sound to the speaker using a suitable low-impedance voltage source that will tolerate the several amperes of 60-hertz current needed to power the locomotive.  For example, you could broadcast music, your own voice, recordings of real trains, and so on.  You could also put a speaker in a car to make appropriate sounds, like animal sounds from a circus car.

As Little Tommy notes, however, this has to be done with real-sinewave transformers, not new-fangled phase control.  The spectrum of the latter includes a lot of high-frequency harmonics of 60 hertz from the sharp edges of the modified waveform.  It's these harmonics that you hear, not the 60-hertz fundamental.